


Echo

by 1in5billion



Category: Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-10
Updated: 2020-05-10
Packaged: 2021-03-03 00:33:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 923
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24115819
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/1in5billion/pseuds/1in5billion
Summary: "When you seek Love with all your heart, you shall find its echoes...in the universe." - Rumi
Relationships: Leia Organa/Han Solo
Comments: 3
Kudos: 28





	Echo

“Leia.”

There was someone next to her in the bed, awake and staring at the ceiling, just like she was, but the voice that called out to her was higher. Feminine. Hauntingly familiar.

“Leia.”

It was the only word Padmé had ever spoken to her daughter before she died, and it echoed through Leia’s mind as clearly as if it had been whispered in her ear. She was unsettled. If Han noticed, he had the good sense to pretend he didn't, but he reached under the covers to take her hand all the same. He had learned, in the short time that they had been married, to let her come to him with things. She did not appreciate being probed—she had spent all too much of her life being asked impossible questions by people with the authority and power to hurt her if she did not answer quickly enough, or did not say the right thing. No, it was better to wait. Then, whenever she was comfortable, she would sit next to him, rest her head on his shoulder, and spill whatever was on her mind. It had been a lengthy process, but she was learning to place her trust in him. He had more than proven himself as a vault in which she could keep the darkest parts of herself. 

Sure enough, a moment later, she rolled over to face him.

“I can hear something.”

“You can…hear…something?” Han repeated, but he thought he knew what she was talking about. It had been a couple years, but he still remembered Luke on Hoth, reaching out into the empty air and whispering, “Ben…Dagobah…” That time, too, there had to have been something there. He was half-frozen and out of it, but Luke had never hallucinated anything. If he said something was there, something was there. “Is it a Force ‘something’ or do I need to get my blaster?”

He propped himself up on his elbow, but Leia pulled him back down, a soft blush creeping up her cheeks. In the immediate aftermath of the fall of the Empire, when they had first started living together, there had been nights when the slightest breeze outside was the drawing of a blaster. A storm was a trigger being pulled. Ships landing nearby were Imperial fighters. Though neither of them ever spoke its name out loud, Han and Leia both knew it was post-traumatic stress keeping every one of her nerves on a permanent edge. And while they both knew there wasn’t really a threat, Han slept with his blaster on the bedside table anyway, should anything or anyone ever try to lay a finger on her again.

“It’s my mother. I can hear her.”

“But your mother is…”

“Dead, I know. But she’s whispering my name.”

Leia did not say aloud the last part she was thinking, that she was hearing her mother’s death inside her mind. She hadn’t even lived through the night when the twins were born, so Leia’s name had to have been one of her dying words. 

“You don’t need that,” Leia said, and Han withdrew his hand from the table. “It’s a Force ‘something.’”

“What do you think it means?”

Leia knew exactly what it meant. For night after night, she had been dreaming of another planet, one covered in sparkling lakes and trees greener than anything else in the entire galaxy. At first, she thought it had been Alderaan, but after the first couple nights, she realized that there were no mountains in her dreams. The palaces looked similar, but wherever this one was, it wasn’t the one she had grown up in.

“I want to go to Naboo.”

“That’s—”

“On the other side of the galaxy, I know.”

“I was going to say that’s a good idea.”

“Really?”

“If she’s calling to you, I think that’s a good starting place.”

Han had never really understood the Force, but to his credit, he was trying so hard. This was the closest he had come to having a full grasp on what it felt like.  
“I’m afraid it’s going to be like losing her all over again,” Leia said, as she relaxed into his arms again. “I don’t know how many families I can stand to lose. I’ve lost two already, and that’s two too many.”

“That’s the last one you’ll ever lose,” Han said, leaning down to kiss her hair. “You’re safe, Princess. You think anything that could ever hurt you could get past me?”

“Not a chance,” she said with a laugh.

“Exactly. We’re going to get you better. I promise. But for now, just trust me. We’ll go to Naboo. You and me. We’ll swim in the lake and watch the sun set and spend a few days living how your mother lived. And when you feel connected to her again, we’ll come back and you can start your training with Luke.”  
“You really think this is going to fix me?”

“No. You don’t need fixed. You’re not broken, you’re not…I don’t know…a hyperdrive.”

They grinned at each other as images of weaving in and out of asteroids entered their minds.

“You actually went into an asteroid field.”

“They were crazy to follow us,” Han said, planting another kiss on her forehead. “Get some sleep, Princess. We can pack in the morning, okay?”

She closed her eyes, but opened them slowly after a moment.

“Han?” Even her voice was exhausted.

“Yes?”

“You can put the blaster away tonight. I don’t need it.”


End file.
